Ladies Lifting Weights

I'm sure that most people (aside from Hulk Hogan or Magnus Ver Magnusson from Met-Rx World's Strongest Man Competition) would not find a beefy, muscular woman all that attractive. It's just not something we're accustomed to see that often. It frightens us. It's like seeing a pink poodle mixed with a pit bull and getting some fluffy beast that kills but still gets fashionable haircuts. However, there is an all too common misconception that women tend to have about getting buff and weight lifting.

TOO MANY women believe that if they lift weights they'll turn into the muscle-bound poodle, or some sick Russian gymnast. FALSE. Lifting weights is a great way to stay toned and in shape, regardless of gender. Women very seldom get buff. You have to try really hard to get that way if you are a woman. Furthermore, the typical weight lifting that women should do on a regular basis is toning and strengthening, not body building exercises. What does that mean? It means that instead of lifting a lot of weight with few repetitions and sets, women should lift lighter, more manageable weights with a lot of repetitions and a higher number of sets. It's that simple.

So if I have to hear one more time from a girl at the gym say, "I don't wanna get buff," after I tell them they should lift weights, I'm going to do a lot more than roll my eyes. I'm going to judge her. Right then and there. Judgement. No, I won't condemn her soul, but I will label her in my mind as ignorant and try to enlighten her. Ladies, don't be that girl.

Tofu that tastes like George Clooney

Cannibalism. It's mostly myth, extremely rare when it actually happens, and appalling to most people, except, well, cannibals. But I just discovered a little news that might help us all rethink cannibalism. As it turns out, PETA is trying to promote a new George Clooney-flavored tofu. While this might sound like satire, I assure you it is not. I wish it were. Oh the irony! 

On the one hand, you have an organization that proclaims the rights of animals from the streets to the roof tops with nude protests, banners, court challenges, and interesting melanges of all of those. On the other, it encouraged Ben and Jerry's to use human breast milk (so as not to exploit cows) and now is promoting a human flavored tofu. Here's where I tend to think the philosophy is starting to run over itself. The animal is put before the human. In order to save the animals, they would have us eat humans (or at the very least tofu flavored like George Clooney). 

Now you may be curious as to how PETA is going to make this George Clooney-flavored tofu. Well, one of PETA's supporters managed to get a hold of his sweaty gym towel, and, just as they make artificial chicken flavor for gravy, they will extract his "essence", replicate it, and make it into tofu. Now, I do know of quite a few women who say, "That George Clooney, I would just eat him up," but I somehow don't think those same women would be interested in tofu flavored like him. Just a guess. I could be wrong for some of you, but my guess is that PETA is not pinning their success on the actual product, but on the mere marketing value. It's like selling holy relics. Like saying certain water was blessed by such and such a saint and so it is special. Well I'm not buying it PETA. I may be all for treating animals humanely, but I'm not about to become a cannibal, especially when we're talking about Mr. Clooney.

The Gym (and the fakers)

Picture taken from this blog

The gym is a great place to go to get in shape.  It is however, not the only place, and I think some people will never figure that out.  I go to the gym 3-5 times a week to lift weights and occasionally use the cardio machines.  I always go with my buddy Todd, unless he makes an excuse and runs out on me (which unfortunately happens a lot). But we generally have a good time.  We have set routines, jokes, and it is a very worthwhile workout.

But the things we've seen there are pretty funny. You can pick out the pretenders. When a kid shows up with his friend with socks up to his knees, about as bony as a skeleton, and proceeds to the largest dumbbells on the bench, I can't help but chuckle. And then there are the pretty boys. They show up with their designer shorts and t-shirts, roll up the sleeves and just stare at their arms as they do curls. The narcissism is very entertaining to watch. The real gym goers stick with scrubby clothes, and beat the sh*t out of their bodies with the weights. That is Todd and my game. And, a gym visit of course wouldn't be complete without some ridiculously inappropriate comment about sweat, someone's mom, or homosexuality.

Some of the most memorable moments about the gym generally involve breaking something. My brother and Todd have both smashed their cell phones with me.  My brother did it when he put his cell phone next to the bench, did a couple sets, then dropped the weights.  The weights then bounced onto his phone, rendering the screen inoperable.  The funny part was, he talked about it before he did it, and tried to put his phone far enough away from the blast zone. The problem was that we were doing incline, so the weights bounced more than if we had been doing reps with a flat bench. Todd crushed his phone when we were throwing boulders in my front yard for a St. Patrick's Day party.  And, one time when Todd and I were at the gym we saw a kid slam down the dumbbells from an incline bench and shatter the mirror in front of him. I'm glad I've been around to share these retarded moments.

But getting back to pretenders.  My advice is to either learn how to work out right, or go running or play tennis.  The gym is for real deal workouts.

Goodbye DC

Well, my visit back home to the DC area was certainly eventful. I came for my brother's graduation from Thomas Jefferson High School (which consequently is the nation's best). Or, so say the High School rating people (whoever they are). And it got me thinking. If his school is 'the best,' then what school is 'the worst?'

Because to be honest the term 'the best' tends to strike me as perhaps a little subjective. It's like saying vanilla ice cream is the best. Or that Porsche 911 Turbo's are the best. While some of you may think they are, and in some ways they might be, I'm not so sure. I mean, I know what they're saying, from an academic standpoint, but surely, as most people in the US know, that standpoint certainly doesn't always make a school better. You have to factor in the human element and ask questions like: "Is our school made up of entirely nerds?" "Have we won anything significant other than ACADEC?" "Do most of the kids here know how to tie their own shoes or cook a bowl of rice?" "Could anyone here pull off a sweet prank?"


So, at any rate, I can't say I'm entirely sold at this point on his school being 'the best.'

Other than that though another thing I noticed when I came home is how much people eat. Back in Provo, on my own I eat when I'm hungry. Here I eat when people have a meal ready. And so of course, there are two to three times the number of meals, and the food is served in much larger portions and at least in my opinion, is not as healthful as the food I eat in Provo. So, of course, I ate more than I should have, don't have a gym membership here, and feel like I have digressed a bit physically speaking. Let's just say, if I stayed here another week, I might take on a new shape...like maybe become one of the block people from Gumby (but more realistically I would probably look more like pokey after he found a room full of pie). It was, in other words a deliciously sinful weekend.

And on another note, today I return home alone. My brother who came out here with me is staying as he prepares to go on to Mexico and Haiti (raising money and awareness for the impoverished), and I return to Utahville. It's always bittersweet. On the one hand, I'll miss real thunderstorms, east coast mentalities, the metro, family and a sweet car...but on the other hand I won't have to deal with traffic, eat thanksgiving everyday, or pay for an exorbitant gym membership and I can get paid again by my boss.

The 'Ubersexual' in all of us

Can a man truly consider himself manly if he engages in certain activities? Are there certain things that are just taboo? Where does one draw the line? Let me give an example.

Let's say I know a guy named Fred. He had a floral design class this semester at college. Not only this, but he enjoyed it, and likes arranging flowers. Now, if that were all I'm sure we could easily look over his flower arranging fetish, but he also writes poetry, and even has a poetry blog. And, he likes to cook. Hmmm.....is he borderline metro? Let's look at the wikipedia definition:

"The typical metrosexual is a young man with money to spend, living in or within easy reach of a metropolis – because that's where all the best shops, clubs, gyms and hairdressers are. He might be officially gay, straight or bisexual, but this is utterly immaterial because he has clearly taken himself as his own love object and pleasure as his sexual preference. Particular professions, such as modeling, waiting tables, media, pop music and, nowadays, sport, seem to attract them but, truth be told, like male vanity products and herpes, they're pretty much everywhere.

For some time now, old-fashioned (re)productive, repressed, unmoisturized heterosexuality has been given the pink slip by consumer capitalism. The stoic, self-denying, modest straight male didn't shop enough (his role was to earn money for his wife to spend), and so he had to be replaced by a new kind of man, one less certain of his identity and much more interested in his image – that's to say, one who was much more interested in being looked at (because that's the only way you can be certain you actually exist). A man, in other words, who is an advertiser's walking wet dream."

Well I'm pretty sure Fred goes to the gym and uses moisturizer creams, but does this make us question his sexuality? Perhaps not. Perhaps he took the floral design class because he knew the ratio of girls to guys would be 20:1 and he wanted to look more caring, affectionate and get a few more dates. Perhaps he writes poetry to emulate one of the most notorious lady's men of all time, Lord Byron, and perhaps he cooks because he enjoys a good meal every now and then. Hmmm. Even if these justifications were true, it leads one to wonder. Maybe he's just ubersexual. Never heard of it before? Here's the definition:

The word "'übersexual" (from German über = above, superior and Latin sexus = gender) was claimed to be coined by the authors of the book Future of Men (O'Reilly, Matathia, Salzman, 2005). It is a variant of metrosexual. The word seems to have been inspired by the phrase "uber-metrosexual", used by the creator of the metrosexual Mark Simpson to describe David Beckham. Salzman appropriated Simpson's work on the metrosexual in 2002 to sell another book.

Simpson has pointed out that the book contains several deliberate misrepresentations of him, his work, and the history of the metrosexual.

Many of the "top ubersexuals" named by Salzman, such as Bono, Bill Clinton and George Clooney were on her list of "top metrosexuals" in 2003.

The authors of Future of Men argue that the übersexual is not derivative of the metrosexual man.

The future of men, proclaim the authors, is "not to be found in the primped and waxed boy who wowed the world with his nuanced knowledge of tweezers and exfoliating creams. Men, at the end of the day, will have to rely on their intellect and their passion, their erudition and professional success, to be acknowledged and idealised in contemporary society. Called the 'übersexual'—-a degree of greatness and perfection, an acknowledgment that this is an evolved species of man—he is so perfect as to leave little margin for error and fallacy."

Some, including Simpson and Armistead Maupin, have suggested that behind this confused/confusing marketing-speak there was something rather simpler going on: a homophobic attempt to stop the metrosexual being so "gay". Or, as Salzman herself put it proudly, the ubersexual (unlike the metrosexual) "doesn't invite questions about his sexuality".

Simpson has argued that from the beginning the appropriation of the metrosexual concept by American marketers such as Salzman in 2003 was always about trying to straighten him out. His original definition of the metrosexual was sexually ambiguous, or at least went beyond the straight/gay binary; marketers, in contrast, insisted that the metrosexual was always "straight" – they even tried to pretend that he wasn't vain.

However, they failed to convince the public - hence the uber-straight ubersexual.

Despite a large global PR push for their 'new', completely 'non-gay' metrosexual, and a slavishly uncritical press which failed to notice that the list of top ten ubersexuals was largely the same as the one's they'd been printed two years previously for top ten metrosexuals, the 'ubersexual' failed to catch on with the public and was stillborn, as Salzman has admitted herself.

That's it, he's ubersexual. Let's cut to the chase. The author of this blog post is Fred. And on a the occasion of a friend's graduation party from college he dressed up in a very well tailored pin stripe suit, hand-woven silk tie and polished black shoes with Armani cologne. This is when his friend's mother declared him an ubersexual along with her son who had just graduated. Intrigued I of course had to do some research before accepting the title. Then along came wikipedia. I suppose now I must agree.